Search box

The most commonly used search text box is waaaaay down the sidebar and often requires user to scroll down to the search box. In the sidebar, for Navigation and Jump Pages, there is little need for another (2nd) indentation. Removing the 2nd indentation will compress the list in such a manner that the search bar will be visible. —Egberts, 05:32, January 23, 2008 (EST)

Agreed; particularly for users whose display resolution is 800x600, or less. But, can anybody tell me how I can put the Searchbar higher? (I am still looking.) That way, I can add the jump pages back to the Sidebar, but lower down the pane. —RWSmith(Bureaucrat), 01:21, January 25, 2008 (EST)

Suggestions

Any other suggestions, requests, or comments for making the Sidebar better? —RWSmith(Bureaucrat), 01:21, January 25, 2008 (EST)

Customized Sidebar (navigation pane on the left)

EXCELLENT decision to put a direct link to the merit badges on the front page under Boy Scouts. Saves us time almost every time we use the site! EagleForumFan 18:42, December 16, 2007 (EST)

Where did it go? Can we please get the direct link back on the front page? Saves a lot of clicks. EagleForumFan 01:21, January 25, 2008 (EST)

Well, somebody else asked that the Sidebar (added left pane links) be removed because it put the search box too far down the page. So, I did, even though I liked it. (The two screens I use when editing are on the high-end of resolution; so, I still saw the search box. Now, what I'm going to try to do is find a happy medium... i.e., set my res. down to 800x600 and work on it. Anybody who's interested, let's take this conversation over to MediaWiki talk:Sidebar. —RWSmith(Bureaucrat), 00:38, January 31, 2008 (EST)

Prune Me!

I think that the Sidebar is wasting valuable real estate. I think that we should remove:

Community Portal - outdated? of what usefulness?

Current events - also very old, plus the link is at the top of the main page

Random page - fun, but does anyone need this?

Donations - can be combined with about

I would really like to see some discussion on this weeks-old topic. Scouterdennis 14:39, November 29, 2008 (EST)

Okay, okay! After much discussion, a good deal of thinking, and a lot more waiting... here's what I've come up with:

Donations has been removed -- Why? Well, Mike is (still) paying for everything and nobody (still) has yet to come up with a foolproof way to make donations without having to go through incorporating, not to mention the never-ending cycle of gobs and gobs of paperwork, filings and mailings. If somebody knows how Mike can do this without incurring any PAIN, please speak up. Plus, we can promote (place links) supporting Mike's Merit Badge Phamplet collection in other, appropriate locations.

Random page is about as useless as it is random -- I think everybody is in agreement on this one. Enough said.

Current Events has also been deleted -- Actually, I wanted to keep this one. And, quite frankly, it didn't come to me 'til the last three or four seconds (No, really!) while I was editing Navi that this one could come out, too! For one thing, we can still promote it on the Main Page, in the usual upper-right header; and for another, we can (should) push it for what it's best made for... an RSS feed!

Community Portal stays -- It should be wikied up to work much like Wikipedia's does, which, from what I can see, has already been done, quite nicely, too. I will say though, some of what's on our Main Page might (possibly?) be better over on the Community Portal. But, for sure, the CP is the Editor's Page. This is where we (Admins) entice, encourage, guide Users to become Editors and they to be good (consistent) at it. Even on their home page, the CP.

I don't think that we should add it back to the Sidebar, especially since it is already at the top of the Main Page and it is so easily placed on other pages (such as the Portal pages) by simply adding {{CE update}} to the top of the page. I don't understand why the big concern about stuff moving the search box down because of the translation tools, but at the same time adding stuff to the navigation box. BTW, there is an easily installed extension (<inputbox>) that allows you to place a search box anywhere you like in a page. Scouterdennis 08:44, December 17, 2008 (EST)

We can add a language translate feature to the sidebar!

Every page of MeritBadge.Org needs to be available in at least the top 12 languages in the US. Of course, Spanish heads the list. At the last census, 70 counties were already primarily Spanish speaking including Miami-Dade. New Mexico will be the first state to switch to Spanish as it's most common language followed by California, Texas, and Arizona.

Every page, every requirement, every resource, needs to be made available in Spanish, not just a few. The Hispanic culture is all about God and family just as the BSA is. What a great fit if only our materials could be in Spanish.

MeritBadge.Org can fix much of this problem Right Now!

For about 30 second earlier today, I add translations features to the sidebar. Just long enough to test it and take the screen-shots. With a mouse click, all of the pages at MeritBadge.Org could be instantly translated into Spanish! Suddenly the "sidebar" page is "la barra lateral."

Right Now MeritBadge.Org could go from offering 600 great pages in English to offering 600 great pages in the 12 most common second languages in the US!

This is just using the Google Language Tools to translate our pages. It took a couple of tricks to get it to work but there is no cost.

One possible downside is that no software is as yet foolproof in translating idioms like "Left Off" or "Right ON!". The Chevy "Nova" did not sell well in South America as a "Nova" because it means "No Go." So there will be errors that may even be funny but at least the meanings should be understandable. Also, this does extend the length of the sidebar but in checking, almost all of our pages that are not stubs are already longer than this. Finally, when you click a language, it will stay in that language. We need to find a way to easily get the user back to English.

So can we try adding sidebar links to the top 12 languages?

MeritBadge.Org will be the only Scouting website fully open to Hispanic, Japanese, Korean, Vietnamese, and so many other Scouts!

For about 30 seconds today, MeritBadge.Org opened it's doors to thousands more Scouts, their leaders and families. To flip it back on, just undo my last change on the MediaWiki:Sidebar.— Milominderbinder2(Sysop) 14:26, December 16, 2008 (EST)

Let's do it! (This is an AWESOME idea, by the way! -- Thanks, Craig.) I'm going to go ahead and turn it on. Craig, if you could make this subject an article, and feature it on the Main Page, or the Community Portal, I'd appreciate it. —RWSmith(Bureaucrat), 16:15, December 16, 2008 (EST)

Well, with the preview, the Search box was above the Translations, but now that it's been implemented, the Search box is now below them... If this can be fixed, (anybody), please go ahead. And, oh, we also need to look into Betawiki. —RWSmith(Bureaucrat), 16:40, December 16, 2008 (EST)

Since the translation stay turned on, as you go to different pages, this is truely 'language' features not page 'translate'. So I will change the heading to 'language' to match wikipedia. I do not know how to get the translate (soon to be 'language') box under under the Search box. The code looks like it should do it per the MediaWiki:Sidebar page. Maybe a feature is not turned on? Also, we need an easy way for someone to turn the translator back off. They may not know to just edit the address bar to remove the Google part of to press the back button.— Milominderbinder2(Sysop) 17:01, December 16, 2008 (EST)

Can you install the patch? If not, I guess it goes on the list with the other patches we need, Hide/Show, string extensions for the new templates and to be able to upload doc files. Can we keep the language links in the sidebar for now even though we would prefer a better location? There are people who I have been working with who need those language links tonight. Please let us light a candle, even if it is not in the perfect place. — Milominderbinder2(Sysop) 22:43, December 16, 2008 (EST)

I'll try my best. I know that you and Dennis and Missylou2who have been awesome—more than awesome; but Craig, I must say, this language idea of yours is –far and away– the single most important thing we could ever hope to accomplish with this website. (We need to bring the MediaWiki software up to a minimum of v1.13 to resolve this issue; the latest version is 1.13.3. I'm really tied up for the next couple of days; but, if I decide v1.13 is stable, then I'll do my best to get it worked out. Say a prayer.) —RWSmith(Bureaucrat), 01:43, December 17, 2008 (EST)

I say that we implement this now and worry about moving the search box later. Version 1.13 has a lot of cool features we could use! Scouterdennis 08:32, December 17, 2008 (EST)

Someday we may get all of the patches and updates we need. For now, we can only do the best we can with what we have. After discussion with RW, we added Spanish and a link for More languages that goes to the new Languages page.— Milominderbinder2(Sysop) 17:17, December 17, 2008 (EST)

Sidebar location in Firefox

I have noticed that when using the site in Firefox the left menu is forced down. This has never been an issue before and I know way beyond my permissions. Who would I contact about it? Jzweiac 21:27, January 23, 2012 (EST)

First, did you recently update Firefox? If so (and you probably did), from what version to what version? (Considering all the awesomeness Firefox offers, I've tried to convert to many times; but, I've just never been able to make the switch stick.)

Chrome is my default browser; but, I also keep IE 9 up-to-date because I have to have it under certain circumstances. But, whenever Mozilla comes out with a major update (or, about once or twice a year), I download the latest version just to test it out across the wiki. Anyhow, let me know what version you're currently running. —RWSmith(Bureaucrat), 11:29, January 24, 2012 (EST)

I should of been one step down, and am currently running 9.0.1 Jzweiac 19:39, January 24, 2012 (EST)

If you have any screen shots, send me a couple. Meanwhile, I check it out on my end. —RWSmith(Bureaucrat), 10:41, January 25, 2012 (EST)

Well, I wish I could definitively say that I did it; but, I can't. I mean, it's possible that I somehow flushed the server's cache; but, it does that own it's own. So, I'm guessing you probably cleared your browser's cache.

BTW, this has happened before... but, it was at least a year ago.

Please let me know any details you feel may be of importance if you have any further issues with the sidebar. Thanks, —RWSmith(Bureaucrat), 15:23, February 4, 2012 (EST)